Hello Folks:

Thanks to those of you who are visiting for the first time.  I hope you find our site informative and entertaining.

If you have any further questions about Whitsend Market Garden, feel free to call.  I will be glad to answer any questions you have about our harvest subscription.

What a big change a week of effort can bring.

After some good luck and a bit of help from some of my seed sources, I have been able to track down the last of the seeds I was looking for since the change in organic regulation (see post of a couple of weeks ago).

Most of our seeds for Asian greens, eggplant, and winter-tolerant green onions have now been located.

I made some new contacts, including the folks at Hawthorn Seeds and West Coast Seeds.  Along the way, I located a new source of clover for the footpaths, and an interesting heirloom shell bean, to augment the Kidney Beans at the end of the season.

My success in overcoming this regulatory challenge is a good example of how small scale farms have an advantage over agro-industrial sites.

Like any small business, the small-scale farm is more agile, and can adapt quickly when required.  Pests and diseases are easier to detect, and allow for quicker containment and response.  A snap frost or heat wave is easier to prepare for.

For now, I guess it is back to the everyday work at the farm – until the next challenge comes along!

Thanks to those of you who have signed up this past week.  I look forward to sharing the harvest with you as soon as it is warm enough to grow some plants!

Bob

Here are a few notes about our shares

All shares receive harvests from the first week of June through the last weeks of October, with a couple of “harvests” in November.

In total, there are 20 weeks that I bill for (I assume 2 weeks absence on your part).

 For a $450.00 half share, you can expect about $20.00 worth of fresh food per week.

The $800.00 full shares receive about $40.00 per week.  Small quantities of greens are ready for harvest by the last week of May.  Full shares will receive this extra harvest.

In addition, extra storage crops at the end of the year round out the value of your harvest (there are usually a few weeks at the beginning and end of the season in which the weekly value is a bit lower than average).

These late season harvests include dry beans, storage potatoes, carrots, onions, winter squash and a small quantity of cold tolerant greens (green onions, kale, and winter lettuce).

To ensure I meet my commitment, I plant a little more than is needed to cover for the occasional setback in the season.  Last year, despite having a poor year for broccoli, missing a couple of weeks of lettuce, and having a poor turnout from the leeks, I was still able to generate more food than the value of the shares – half shares received almost $500.00 worth of food.

A few days before the weekly harvest, I will post an estimate of what you will receive on the website (On the page “This Weeks Harvest”).  This will allow you to plan.

I have to emphasize that if there are crops you want more of less of, please let me know as soon as possible, so that I can plant less or more of a certain crop.

Here is a glance at some of the differences between Full and Half Shares:

Full Share	Half Share
2 Heads of Lettuce per week	1 Head of Lettuce per week
2-3 Types of greens per week	1-2 Types of greens per week
Garlic – minimum 16 bulbs	Garlic – minimum 8 bulbs
2-4 Lb Tomatoes each week	1-2 Lb Tomatoes each week
1-2 other Fruit (3-4 peppers, 1-2 cucumber, 1-2 squash, etc.)	1 other Fruit (2-3 peppers, 1-2 cucumber, 1-2 squash, etc.)
1 Lb Carrots each week	1 Lb Carrots every two weeks, alternates with other roots.
1 other root (turnips, beets, celeriac, radish, etc).	1 other root (turnips, beets, celeriac, radish, etc).
1 Lb Beans or Peas each week	1 Lb Beans or Peas every two weeks
1 Lb Potatoes each week	1 Lb Potatoes every two weeks

Quantities are approximate.

I can usually adjust quantities slightly if needed. For example, if you know that 1 ½ Lbs of Potatoes are usually required for your household; I can adjust your average quantity upward.

The quantities for Beans, Peas, Potatoes, Carrots, etc are usually the minimum amount – if there is extra, all shares are topped up.

In the hottest part of the summer, I usually give two or three small  heads of lettuce per share instead of 1 or 2 large heads (they are harvested early to prevent the plants from going to seed as sometimes happens in hot weather).

Sometimes there is a lot of extra produce (such as Carrots or Tomatoes).  On these weeks, I notify all customers that extra food is available.  Those who want to preserve food have the opportunity to take extra.  First come, first serve.

More detailed information can be found on the pages "Harvest Schedule 2013", "On the Menu for 2013", and "Advantages of a Farm Subscription".

Bob

Hello Folks:

Thank you very much for taking the time to check out the Whitsend farm site.  It always pleases me to receive a positive response from my doorstep flyers.

Despite having delivered flyers for the past couple of years, I am always a bit uncomfortable with stepping onto another person’s doorstep, so I do not spend much time looking for the “no solicitation” signs.  My apologies if I missed such a request.  If I do see such requests, I will not leave any flyers at your house.

Flyers are the most feasible way for me to reach the specific neighbourhoods I have targeted as being in my catchment area.

There are several questions that I often receive when pitching my farm subscriptions.  I will try to answer them briefly over the next couple of weeks.  Here are a couple of them:

Why does Whitsend request payment for subscriptions in advance?

Most of the farms overhead for the season is spent before the season begins.  This includes the seeds, supplies, tiller fuel for preparing the beds before planting, and certification fees.

Why does Whitsend sell weekly harvest shares instead of operating a market stand?

- A most important factor to consider is the planning.  If I were to operate a stand during the harvest season, I would need to estimate what customers are going to want on a weekly basis.  For example, I might estimate that six heads of cabbage per week would satisfy the customers’ needs.   On the first day, should 12 customers request cabbage, I would have to turn away six customers.  Should they find their cabbage at another farm stand, they would be less likely to check my stall first on the following week. 

As cabbage requires 55-70 days to develop to maturity, it would be several weeks before being able to harvest the additional demand for cabbage.  This would assume that I would be able to find the extra seed mid-way through the season, and that I would have the extra growing space in the field suitably prepared.

- During a previous career in fundraising, I have found that my sales skills are better suited to developing a one-on-one relationship with a customer, and building it over a number of weeks or years.  I am less effective when trying to catch someone’s attention in a crowd.

Why do I have to take the weekly basket as is?  Why can I not select which items wind up in my share?

During my farm internship (which included workshops at several farms) I wondered why individualizing a customer’s share was not a common practice.  It seemed to me (and I still consider this point to be quite valid) that offering a weekly share tailored to the customer's taste was the ideal way to go.

During the research phase of starting my farm business, I quickly discovered why giving every customer a unique basket is so difficult. 

- Most customers have a basic list of what they want through the year – carrots, potatoes, beans, peas, onions, lettuce, etc.  I can produce these foods through most of the season.  This “basic” harvest share does not add up to a value that would allow me a profit, without greatly expanding my customer base.

- By concentrating so much of my production into just a few crops, I run the risk of losing a sizeable portion of the share should there be a failure of one crop or another, as sometimes happens in agriculture.  The safest way to set up a customer's share is to provide the greatest variety of crops possible.

- Many preferred crops have climatic challenges during parts of the season.  To insure your share against under performing crops, and to provide menu variety, I plant additional foods that thrive in the more extreme parts of the climate season.

- Most of my customers tend to sign up in early spring.  By this time, seed for some crops might be unavailable.  As well, leaving my production plan to the last minute creates a time crunch when I need to focus on other details for a successful season.

Leafy greens provide a good example.  Spinach, Lettuce, and Kale are examples of crops that I can grow for most of the season, though their performance is variable during some parts of the year.  I grow additional leafy greens to augment my regular crops.

During the early part of the year, I grow crops tolerant to cool weather and occasional early frosts, like Arugula and Mache.  As the midsummer period warms up, I switch to heat tolerant greens such as Orach, Amaranth, and Purslane.  I return to the cool weather crops for the late summer and autumn period.

This does leave us with some options.  If I know that ¾ of my customers prefer Purslane to Orach, I can adjust my production plan to suit this particular need.  However, I need to know this at seed purchasing time (November to January).

I am willing to take requests that I can commit to, such as “no hot peppers but extra radishes, please”.

If there is something you absolutely do not want to have, I can remove it from your share.  As long as another share does not go short of a particular crop, I can provide a substitute.  This is usually the case, but I am reluctant to make promises that I am unsure that I can keep.  I know I can supply you with a weekly basket containing a wide variety of high quality produce.

We can provide cooking and preserving tips for everything we plant.  Keep in mind that many of the less well known crops can substitute for common crops in many recipes.

If you would like to sign up for the 2013 season, or still have a few questions, feel free to contact me.  I would be happy to hear from you.

Until then, I have to bundle up and head out to the barn to get some of the building for the season complete - and to drop off a few more flyers.

Talk to you soon!

Hello Folks:

Welcome to those of you who are checking out this site for the first time – I hope you find the virtual side of the farm informative and entertaining.  If you have any questions about purchasing a share for the season, feel free to contact me at the number below.

For the past week, I have been looking for alternate sources of seed (see last week’s post regarding changes in certification requirements).  I have been able to locate most of the seed from a couple of smaller seed producers here in Canada.  As of this writing, the Sprouting Broccoli, Komatsuma, and Vivid Choi are the only items I have yet to find a replacement source.

As part of our ongoing search for foods we wish to develop in the future, I have had a limited amount of success.

My latest lead for Organic Sweet Potato slips has ended in the backyard of a gardening enthusiast that has no official organic certification.  Another item I cannot find is the organic Asparagus seed.   I have located organic starter stalks from US sources, though as these are live plants, they are subject to import/export rules and I cannot bring them across the border.

Parsnip seed is another vegetable that is proving elusive.  One of the seed houses I purchase from (High Mowing Organic Seeds in Vermont) has had their own share of difficulties producing the seed.  They have recently posted a short essay on the challenges of Parsnips, you can learn more about it here: 

parsnip organic seed development

I am pleased to have found Rhubarb seed.  It will take 12 to 18 months for this crop to grow to maturity, so we all have plenty of time to set aside some recipes for this uniquely flavoured food.

A couple of you have commented about the taste of vegetables.

There are many variables related to the taste of food.  Different varieties of the same crop will have slightly different flavours.  I noticed a difference between the Scarlet Nantes Carrots and the Berlicummer Carrots last year, the Nantes being a little more flavourful. 

Compare the Tomatoes grown on our farm or in your backyard with the product on store shelves.  The commercially produced tomato varieties are hybrids selected for resistance to disease, resistance to adverse field conditions, uniformity in appearance, and durability for shipping and shelf life.  Flavour and nutrient content are an afterthought.  To paraphrase Elliot Coleman, “Tome – EH – toes” are available in the grocery stores, but a farm grown “Tome – AWE – toe” fruit can be an extraordinary taste experience.

Weather and growing conditions make a big difference for the flavour of many crops.  Heat and cold, amount of water and other factors alter the chemistry of the food.

Cabbage family crops are known for improving their taste after exposure to cold.  I have heard that some growers will not even think of picking their brussels sprouts until after their first frost.  Hot, dry weather tends to make them stronger tasting, and the cold weather moderates the flavour – they tend to become sweeter.  

Carrots and Parsnips also sweeten after frost.  The cold causes the carbohydrates to change from larger starch molecules to smaller sugar molecules.  Celery that experiences too much heat and too little water can become very bitter as well.

The manner in which plants are grown can also have a big difference in flavour.  I had heard for many years that organically grown food tastes better.  I was somewhat sceptical of this until I did some research. 

Leaf crops fed with too much nitrogen will begin to store the extra nutrient as nitrates, which tend to make the food bitter or even metallic tasting.  Store bought Spinach is such an example.  Many people consider Spinach a bitter flavoured food, though in my experience, the difference is immediately noticeable.  I found that both of our Spinach varieties had a very mild flavour, even after experiencing hot dry weather that usually stresses this crop.  Root vegetables such as carrots also have a noticeable difference when fed petroleum based fertilizer.

Answering the question “How does it taste?” can provoke a very long discussion indeed.  As any chef will tell you, the best recipes can only reach their potential with the finest ingredients.

Hey Folks:

Happy New Year!  Raise a toast (I have a jug of Beau’s Lug-O-Tread local organic brew here for just that) to another year of fruitful farming and tasty eating.

I’m so glad I decided to grow Pumpkins this year.  Our New England Pie variety has turned out to be a versatile squash.  We have eaten it as soup, casserole, and (today), it is the centrepiece of our New Year’s Feast – stuffed with a pilaf of rice, cranberries, and Whitsend-grown Red Onion.  If it turns out, we will post the recipe on our site later.

Work in the barn continues unabated.  A new prep table will increase our harvest efficiency, allowing us to do a quicker job cleaning produce before it leaves the field.  The nursery now has a pair of doors and a real roof.  The nursery grow-lights will get re-mounted this week, and the final insulation bats (organic produce bags stuffed with straw) will be installed.  After that, some tests to determine the optimal temperature settings for the heat mats and space heater.  The Nursery should be ready to take the first seed trays for the Leeks and Bulb Onions by late January or early February.

As the work on the nursery finishes, we’ll start building Trellises for the vine Tomatoes and Cucumbers …

So much about Farm work involves anticipating problems and having a plan B ready.  Sometimes, however, problems requiring a quick response come out of left field. Read on…

The Invisible Fist of the un-free market strikes again

Canada and the United States have an agreement that ensures the organic standards of each country are equivalent.  As of September 11, 2012, this equivalency agreement was cancelled for some crops.

Sodium nitrate is the issue.  Sodium Nitrate is mined from a unique mineral deposit in Chile, and is used by both conventional and organic growers in the US.  In Canada and the E.U., Chilean sodium nitrate is not allowed in organic production.  The USDA and the Canadian Organic Regime had previously agreed to a “twilight period” to phase out the use of Sodium Nitrate on US organic farms. 

The phase out of Sodium Nitrate has “proved to be controversial”, and organic growers in the U.S. have successfully lobbied the USDA to postpone the phase-out date.  They claimed that discontinuing sodium nitrate use would decrease the winter supply of organic leaf crops.  Sodium Nitrate force-feeds the plants, allowing these growers to extract more product from smaller growing regions – southern California and Texas, for example.

The upshot is that many U.S. seeds that were organic last season, lost their Canadian organic status with the stroke of a pen.  Some of the US organic seed I have purchased (and some I had intended to purchase) for 2013 is no longer considered organic in Canada. 

Here is a list of crops that I may not be able to produce in 2013, unless I am able to find an alternate source of seed certified organic by the Canadian Regime:

-Ping Tung Long Asian Eggplant

-DiCicco Broccoli (the cut and come again type)

-Pink Beauty Radish

-Chinese Leeks/Garlic Chives

-Flashy Troutback Lettuce

-Komatsuma Asian Green

-Yakuna Savoy Asian Green

-Green Wave Mustard

-Evergreen Hardy Bunching Onion (The type for late fall and winter growing)

-Vivid Choi

-Sugar Anne Snap Pea

In addition, I had one request for a medium sized, sweet-flavoured Tomato.  Both tomato types I was considering are now unavailable, unless I can find an alternate source or another type that fits the desired criteria.

I have done some muckraking to determine which US organic growers use Sodium Nitrate.  I am certain some of these producers sell organic-labelled product in our area (eg organic salad mix, lettuce, spinach etc. sold in bunches or plastic shell packs at grocery stores).  If I find out which US producers rely on this “feed the plant not the soil” technique, I will be glad to pass the info along, so you have the choice to support real organic growers who use the “feed the soil not the plant” method.

I am drafting an inquiry to my organic certification agency to determine how they are responding to this issue.  I have included a paragraph in my letter saying I expect these “no longer organic products” will not be advertised as organic in Canada.  After all, as an entrepreneur, I expect to do business on a level playing field in the “free market”.